"My Lord, while I have been dragged into this Court, on the mere suspicion of libel, by His Majesty's Attorney-General, I hold in my hand the printed confession of His Majesty's Solicitor-General, Henry John Boulton Esquire, of a crime that the law of England calls murder, committed ten or eleven years ago.[100] Yet no indictment has been brought against him, and this confession is attested by James Fitz Gibbon Esquire, a magistrate of this District, and by the Sheriff of this Court. I hold also in my hand the printed history of an outrage of the grossest character, where a number of young official gentlemen in this town assembled together and committed a noonday burglary, by breaking into the private house of William Lyon Mackenzie, and destroying his property. This atrocious outrage, please your Lordship, was proved on the floor of this Court, in the presence of His Majesty's Attorney-General. The perpetrators were identified and sworn to, yet no indictment has ever been brought against them, while the Attorney-General is busying himself in sending spies and informers into my printing office to bring me up for imaginary offences." The Attorney-General could hardly be expected to sit quietly under such accusations as these, made in open Court, and listened to by the bench without any expression of disapprobation. He rose in some heat, and remarked that he hoped the Court would not allow the public business to be thus interrupted. "The defendant," said he, "is not upon his trial, nor has he ever been arraigned. He seems merely to be indulging himself in an attack upon me as Attorney-General--an attack which could not have any bearing upon his own case, even if it were now before a jury; but which at present is nothing but a most improper interruption of the business of the Court, by an harangue intended to prejudice the public mind before he shall be put upon his trial. As to the matters of which he has spoken, I am not to be called to account by him, or by any other defendant, for the discharge of my official duties with respect to other parties not now before the Court. I am at all times ready to account for my proceedings as Attorney-General to the Government for whom I act, and to whom I am responsible; but I trust that the Court will not suffer a person whom I merely know as defendant upon bills for libels of the most disgraceful kind, and whose arraignment upon these charges has been postponed, as an indulgence, at his own request--I trust that such a person will not be allowed to address the Court in this irregular manner, for the mere object of calumniating me, whose duty it is to conduct the prosecutions against him." A brief silence followed these words, after which Collins resumed, and was allowed to proceed without further interruption.